[68]. Thinking her to be a Jinn or Ghul in the shape of a fair woman. This Arab is a strange contrast with the English fisherman, and yet he is drawn with truth.
[69]. Arab. “Habbazá!” (good this!) or “Habba” (how good!): so “Habba bihi,” how dear he is to me.
[70]. Arab. “Zind,” and Zindah the names of the two sticks, upper and lower, hard and soft, by which fire was kindled before flint and steel were known. We find it in Al-Hariri (Ass. of Banu Haram) “no one sought fire from my fire-stick (i.e. from me as a fire-stick) and failed.” See Night dccciii.
[71]. Arab. “Názih” i.e. travelled far and wide.
[72]. “Rajab,” lit. = “worshipping:” it is the seventh lunar month and still called “Shahr-ĭ-Khudá” (God’s month) by the Persians because in pre-Islamitic times it formed with Muharram (or in its stead Safar), Zu ‘l-ka’adah and Zu ‘l-Hijjah (Nos. 1 or 2; 7, 11 and 12) the yearly peace, during which a man might not kill his father’s murderer. The idea must have taken deep root, as Arab history records only six “impious (or sacrilegious) wars,” waged despite the law. Europeans compare it with the Treuga Dei (truce of God) a seven-years peace established about A.D. 1032, by a Bishop of Aquitaine; and followed in A.D. 1245 by the Pax Regis (Royal Peace) under Louis VIII. of France. This compelled the relations of a murdered man to keep the peace for forty days after the offence was committed.
[73]. His Majesty wrote sad doggrel. He is better at finessing, and his message was a trick because Rose-in-Hood had told him that at home there were special obstacles to the marriage.
[74]. Arab. “Majzub” = drawn, attracted (literally); the popular term for one absorbed in the contemplation of the Deity. During this process the soul is supposed to quit the body leaving the latter irresponsible for its actions. I remember a scandal being caused in a village near Tunis by one of these men who suddenly started up from his seat in a dusty corner and, in presence of a small crowd of people, had connection with a she-donkey. The supporters of the holy man declared that the deed was proof positive of his exceptional holiness; but there were lewd fellows, Moslems Voltaireans, who had their doubts and held that the reverend man had so acted “for the gallery.” A similar story is told with due reserve by the late Abbe Hamilton in his book on the Cyrenaic. There are three grand divisions of the Sufis; (1) Mukímán, the stationaries; (2) Sálikán, the travellers, or progressives, and (3) Wásilán, those who reach the desired end. And No. 2 has two classes: the Sálik-i-majzúb, one progressing in Divine Love; and the other, who has made greater progress, is the Majzúb-i-Sálik (Dabistan iii. 251).
[75]. Arab. “Sundus,” a kind of brocade (low Lat. brocare, to figure cloth), silk worked in high relief with gold and silver. The idea is figurative meaning it was hung outside and inside with fine stuff, like the Ka’abah, the “Bride of Meccah.” The “lords” means simply the lost girl.
[76]. Arab. “Ayn” lit. eye, also a fount, “the eye of the landscape” (a noble simile); and here a helper, guard, assistant.
[77]. “Lord” for lady, i.e. she.